the song bird still sings for me
by So Guhn
Summary: She went to the sea, not him. Rin x Archer, some Saber x Shirou.


_the song bird still sings for me_ **- 15+ ; angst/romance - Rin x Archer** (some one-sided implications, plus a little **Saber x Shirou** AND WHAT IS THAT.)

--

She was not running from him.

That was what her eyes say when she stares him down, blacker, grey, starlight encompassed by clouds. The salty wind passes them by and he can taste it, like the tears she never shed, tall and straightforward, unyielding and strong, the day he chose her was the day, the very first day on meeting on (we are equals.) But if that was, so then this- her hands are fists at her sides, and her expression is of ironic dignity. (Her younger sister bends over, a hand by her mouth to whisper her secret into the lips of a hollow blossom; Rin did not see why this was necessary. Why did flowers only talk to flowers?)

"Why did you come?"

The sound of waves crashing, sand latched on- on the entirety of the soles of their feet, about their ankles, pressing, engraving, what sort of memory was this? Archer is unmoving, the wind, that sea breeze tantalizing, and consuming around them. Maybe he doesn't understand, and maybe it is because he does that he wants her to too, he wants her to face it. He wants her to move past it. "Do you really not know?"

It would be difficult for them to ever be like those two. Saber looking down and Shirou looking up all until they reached and bend, all until they could both see the same horizon. How he had held out his hand not for assistance, but just for her, how he had. His unworthy self, to this king, this king that was a woman in his eyes, and truly had Saber been one then, just a woman, just a girl in love. And Archer cannot see him and Rin like that, even if so much an impossible sliver was possible, to work all the way to it, he would. He wanted it, he wanted it for the both of them, he wanted it for her. That sort of thing, was better.

(Better than that, this-, a sigh that is not agony, but torment, but the hand against the curtain shifting as she had, thinking, always thinking "I won't leave your side again.") Archer had always remained at her side, they did not question it, he didn't, she didn't. It was almost given, the way one palm may fit into, onto another. The way that sea shells were a pair. Was it like that then, weren't they the matching pair, the pair that fit? Or was it discolouration that was driving them away, was it not wanting to be a pair, trying, but not working? If he wanted to hold her and she did not want to be held, the point of wrapping his arms around her would be- (she made her lunch, the rest of the time they went to school, box lunches, sacks, make was even bought, she did not ever tell another lie, she did not leave her side but the chopsticks, the spoon, the fork, her fingers against the other's- they never stayed long enough to warm, they did not think they had the privilege.)

His step forward, are hers unmoving, even as a wave crashes forward again and again, and washes at her feet, seaweed drifting on the rebound and passing her ankle, catching for a mere moment like his heart suddenly does, brow that same quirked arrogant- her hair is down, the ribbons are gone, and for all the more reason does she seem more bare today, a lacy dress she wears that is not hers, and it holds ribbons she dares not put in her hair. She bites a lip before, a rising, a star would cease to be with the way her gaze held strong (were the insides breaking?) "Go back."

She knows.

He moves forward and holds her, in this one-sided embrace, all because she thinks she cannot love any more, not after what happened.

(They had a garden, this large house, this small house, this home, and maybe her heart did not know what it meant to be full and that was why she remained devoted to study, to magic, to achievement, Sakura would sometimes loose Rin's place in a book and she would become irritated, once she had yelled, only once, and in apology, Sakura- "Onee-san, let me do your hair." Little fingers, ribbons into bows. Rin learned to memorize the page number from then on, so that Sakura would never have to say Rin's apology ever again) tears do not spring up in her eyes as her forehead lays against his shoulder, her hands unmoving as her body at his sides, unable to think for mere seconds, the sea already took her tears, the whole ocean had to be her tears, because no matter what she could not cry. She was not allowed.

"Archer."

And the way she says his name is enough for him to not listen to her orders, a second time, a third time, (I won't leave you) he has always had faith in her words, always unswayed, they were equals and he followed her as she followed him. Now, now she could follow him until those shadowed steps became his shadow (until he too could hold out his hand to her and know that she will not take it, she will be able to neither accept or refuse it but stand on her own and that is the most glorious of things, like rebuilding-) "Rin, it is all right now."

Just pulling her closer, to swallow her, like the sea could, "You did all you could, it's done, live and remember, but do not let that memory consume you- live."

And her shoulders are shaking, her head is shaking, she was supposed to get mad and she probably is, but too tired to fully show it (and his insides are breaking too.) He holds her away to look at her face, still those unmoved eyes, just gazing looking, just (I'm fine, it's over, it's my fault, let me atone, let me-)

"Sakura would not want you to give up just because she is dead."

And Rin does not say anything, mouth frowning, frowning and twisting to make up the words she wants to say but do not exist in mere human speech. Everything she wants to say- (Sakura sits at an angle from her across the table, they sit on the floor, and Rin's hands move, just one, to move over Sakura's- head tilting, everyone was out and out, Archer in the house somewhere, over it, guarding, Saber and Shirou gone, Illya in that room sleeping, no visitors but Sakura, just Sakura saying that she wants to cook and Rin telling her that she doesn't have to any more, again, offering her tea, making it and trying to act as the older sister should, but unable and entrapped in the memory and guilt of the younger self, unable to express, unable to move forward or backward, harmful and Sakura had moved her hand away, tucking it with the other upon her legs, mannerism, eyes downcast though she had a forceful temper learned from Rin. "I'll go now.")

"But," a foot digs into the sand, the water is cold, a mist, a dark sky, dreary. This was her escape, but a final wish, not a final any thing. They had looked for her, Saber wanting to give her time, Shirou worried- agitated his brow bunching in that manner it always did, and Archer just ("I know." a starry night, no clouds, he had told Rin and she looked up at him, expression unmoved until her gaze widen but a centimeter. She understood. Trying to shake it off, smile, smirk. "What do you mean?" She knew what he meant. Continue.) Her words, all it was. "-it is my fault." (that she died, that she was alone, that she suffered.) And her hands come up to his arms and holds, deathly grip, snake, and rat and dog, and she would only cry if every star disappeared, fell.

(Rin's hands on the table, just looking at her, blinking rapid for a moment, and lips for once- unfinding, knowing the words and knowing that Sakura was aware too, and there was tension, displeasure, confusion, longing- "I'm sorry."

An apology she never had to make to Rin, what did Sakura have to apologise to Rin for? There was nothing, there should only be Rin's apology to Sakura, and her chest within- there is a quiver, and she gives a negative shake of the head. "Sakura-"

"Good bye."

And there was a car, moving fast on the street, and it had been night, and it had been her unsaid confession to Archer's said confession that it happened- it was this exchange that had been a curse, a punishment, and the guilt that stemmed in flow was now endless.)

A hand in her hair, fingers at her scalp, on it, impatience and that longing and only- he says nothing to her, and she says nothing else, the ocean speaks for them, repeating again and again the words both of them cannot say, she steps away from his embrace, his arms fall, a broken stem, hanging, hanging, dangling, a sliver of skin not pulsating, but allowing the head, the heart to linger. She turns from him, walking to the sea (further, deeper), to her ankles, to her knees, to her waist, and he has followed her, catching her wrist, (her misery) before it may fall into the water before he has touched it first. (What Rin had said thereafter, standing, to Sakura's back before it happened, not knowing it would happen, it had not been a farewell, could not, and was not anything of the such- such it was only-) "I-"

And before Archer continues Rin whirls around, the water moving slowly, as she moves quickly, it moves only at its will, upon gravity, upon momentum, and Rin presses her faulty fingers to his lips, "Don't say it."

And her fingers fall from those lips, as she falls back into the sea, to her neck, Archer following, the feel of her fingers not enough, as he seeks hers out and gentle, kiss, a first, not a last, not a first, a last, the sea could be his tears too, they both cannot cry (they have always been equals) and he pulls away, the water lapping between them, hushed. His fingers fumbling in the water, about her waist, feet still touching the bottom, the bottom that does not exist, and fumbling further further, the water picking up the skirt of her dress and he can only touch her flesh under the water, an arm around her shoulders, hand dipping to touch her back, lips against her cheek, they are salty, it is salty, this water, the pads of his fingers curving up to trace over the underside of her breast before pressing his palm against it entirely and pressing- touching, the ends of her hair turning darker in the water, drifting as the seaweed had, her arms slung over his shoulders now, locking around his neck, over it and harshly gripping, could the sea swallow them? Her hips falling, always falling forward against his, clothing water logged, just pressing, without enter, without cause, with cause, effect, her bare skin rubbing at the edges of his body, harsher and not smooth by fabric, that skirt drifting up, he rarely sees her throat, dipping back, eyes closed, hair all in the water, he kisses her neck between the water, unable to taste anything between her and the sea.

Her hair drips from the water on the rise. Both standing, together, less of the sea and more of them. The tide draws in, in, in.

(She wanted to scatter _her_ ashes in the sea, but she is a flower, was a flower. What good would the sea do for her?)

She kisses his lips (again) and tastes only the sea.

This time she does tell her good bye.


End file.
